


There And Not There

by mrs_d



Category: due South
Genre: Case Fic, Chicago Lore, Chicago history, Community: ds_flashfiction, Gen, M/M, Paranormal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2020-01-12 11:11:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18445364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mrs_d/pseuds/mrs_d
Summary: “This is Cody Pierce, 12 years old,” Ray began. “Parents reported him missing in Lincoln about twelve hours ago. Meanwhile, in Chicago, Rosanna Tavares went shopping with her friend and roommate. They got separated at the mall, her friend couldn’t find her by the time the place closed, so she went home, figured Rosanna would be there. But she wasn’t.“Around 1 o’clock this morning, Rosanna Tavares walked into this building with Cody Pierce,” he concluded. “And that’s when the shitstorm started.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration comes from a famous account of alternate dimension/time travel (or one woman having a really weird dream) in Chicago in 1934. (I only realized after I began writing how nicely this fit into the Chicago Lore prompt in the [ds-flashfiction community](https://ds-flashfiction.dreamwidth.org/), which is fortunate and kinda fun!)
> 
> More information on the lore behind the story can be found in the End Notes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The public defender in this story is played by Djanet Sears in two episodes of Season 1. In “Free Willie,” she’s not credited with a name, but IMDb names her Caroline Wilson in “Heaven and Earth,” so that’s what she’s called here.

When Fraser arrived that morning, Ray wasn’t in the bullpen. 

“Interview 2,” said Detective Huey, before Fraser could ask.

“Ah, thank you kindly,” Fraser replied. “Dief?”

He turned to find that Dief had already curled up in his favorite spot under Ray’s desk — the best place to catch crumbs. When Fraser ducked down to look at him expectantly, Dief closed his eyes and rested his head on his paws like he was ready for a nap.

“Fine, suit yourself,” Fraser muttered, and he set off in the right direction.

“You’re gonna want to knock,” Detective Dewey called after him.

Fraser acknowledged this with a wave over his shoulder. He headed down the hall, past Interview Room 1, where two men in dark suits — federal agents, likely — hovered over two women seated at the table. Fraser shook off the worry that that sight triggered in him, and carried on.

He was relieved to see Ray and Lt. Welsh in Interview Room 2 through the small glass window on the door. He knocked lightly, and Lt. Welsh, holding a finger to his lips, let him in. Ray didn’t take his eyes off the two-way glass before them.

“Kidnapping,” Lt. Welsh whispered to Fraser.

“Oh,” said Fraser softly.

“I’m telling you, I wasn’t there,” one of the women at the table in the other room insisted. The other, Fraser could now see, was Caroline Wilson, a public defender. “I didn’t take him.”

“We’ve got two witnesses that can place you in Lincoln last night,” one of the agents countered. “With the boy.”

“So they saw a black woman with a white kid in Lincoln,” the woman exclaimed. Her voice wavered and cracked with emotion. “It wasn’t me, I swear.”

“Agent Flear, we’ve already established that my client has an alibi,” Caroline interjected. “Her friend can attest to her whereabouts up until only a few hours before she entered this building.”

“A few hours in which no one can prove where she was,” Agent Flear concluded triumphantly.

“A few hours in which she would not have had time to go to Lincoln, pick up Cody Pierce, and return to Chicago,” Caroline insisted. “That’s an eight-hour drive one-way. The only thing faster would be a plane, and—”

“Call the airlines,” the suspect interjected. “Check the passenger manifest.”

“Don’t think we won’t,” Agent Flear’s partner threatened.

“We already did,” Ray murmured. Fraser turned to him in surprise, but Ray was still staring straight ahead. “One flight from Lincoln to Chicago in the last twenty-four hours. Two from Omaha. She wasn’t on any of them. Neither was the kid.”

A muscle was jumping in Ray’s jaw; Fraser knew him well enough to know that he was staying still with an effort. Probably craving a cigarette, too, though he kept insisting that he quit the year before he transferred into Ray Vecchio’s job. (He didn’t — or, if he did, he relapsed often; Fraser could smell it on him about once a week.)

“And while you’re at it, call everybody in Illinois with a private plane,” the woman went on. “I guarantee you that none of them know who I am, because none of them took me to Nebraska last night. I wasn’t in Nebraska last night!”

Agent Flear let out a breath. “Ms. Tavares, you were apprehended with the boy in custody—”

“I came here of my own free will,” Ms. Tavares protested. “To get help. Because I had a scared kid with me who couldn’t find his parents!”

“Rosanna, you don’t need to answer any more questions right now,” Caroline said quietly.

“I beg to differ,” Agent Flear’s partner piped up again.

“Beg all you want, Agent Patel,” Caroline said, her voice dropping into a low, dangerous register that Fraser recognized from many a conversation in the interrogation room, “but that doesn’t change the fact that you have no physical evidence tying my client to the abduction of Cody Pierce. Now, you’ve held Ms. Tavares here for hours without charge. It’s time for her to leave.”

“Not until Mr. and Mrs. Pierce get here,” said Agent Flear. “If they can’t identify your client as the woman who took their son—”

“Nobody _took_ him anywhere,” Ms. Tavares interjected. “He got _lost,_ he didn’t know—”

“—if they cannot identify your client,” the agent barreled on, “then she’ll be free to go. Not a minute before.”

Caroline stared him down a moment, then nodded. “Very well,” she said, resigned.

She and the agents kept talking, Ms. Tavares between them with her arms crossed like a sullen teenager. She was young, Fraser realized, though not as young he’d first thought. Her clothes —a flannel shirt tied around her waist, torn jeans, and a black t-shirt — plus her close-cropped hair and nose ring suggested she was a teenager, but her face said differently. He’d put her in her late twenties, if he had to guess — not even ten years younger than himself or Ray.

Beside him, Ray moved, seeming to come to life all at once. He drew a deep breath, shifted his hips, and tapped his first two fingers against his leg. After a second, he caught Fraser’s eye and jerked his head towards the door. Leaving Lt. Welsh behind, Fraser followed him out to his desk.

“Nice to know the weirdness doesn’t just follow you around,” Ray told him as they walked.

“I’m sorry?”

“I mean we got weirdness here day and night, Mountie or no Mountie,” Ray explained. He picked up the mini basketball that Ray Vecchio used to play with and sank into his chair, only to spring up again almost immediately. “I need a coffee. You want one?”

“Sure,” Fraser replied, following him to the break room. It was still early — though Ray looked like he’d barely slept.

Like he’d read Fraser’s mind, Ray said, “I’ve been here since 4.”

“Working on this?”

“Yep.” Ray poured coffee into a paper cup and sniffed it dubiously before handing it to Fraser. “Does this smell okay to you, or should I make some fresh stuff?”

“It’s fine,” said Fraser, taking it. “Thank you,” he added a second later, remembering himself.

Ray acknowledged his thanks with a nod. He sipped at his own cup, then winced and put it down. “Should’ve made some fresh stuff,” he muttered, reaching for the sugar.

When he’d finally fixed his coffee to his liking, he led them back to his desk. Dief poked his nose out from his hiding place, obviously looking for treats, but Ray had none to offer. The wolf consented to having his ears scratched instead. Once Ray’s hands were free, he handed Fraser a file.

“This is Cody Pierce, 12 years old,” he began. “Parents reported him missing in Lincoln about twelve hours ago. He was supposed to walk home from school with his friend and go to their place for dinner. He didn’t meet his friend when he was supposed to, so the friend assumed he changed his mind. And Cody’s parents assumed he was with his friend, so—”

“So they didn’t worry,” Fraser finished.

“Exactly,” said Ray. “When he wasn’t home by 9, they called the friend’s house, found out Cody never made it, and called the police. State troopers locked down the highways, everybody who’d had contact with the kid was hauled into the station, but they got nowhere.”

“Hm,” said Fraser, skimming the details that had been faxed over by the Lincoln and state police. The boy’s picture, obviously a school photo, was grainy, but the boy was fair-haired with a crooked grin.

“Cops looked at the school surveillance system,” Ray continued, as Fraser turned the page to find a series of blurry, black-and-white screen captures that showed the boy pushing open a door and going inside. “Cody went into the boys’ locker room after class, but he didn’t come out, and neither did anybody else.”

“I see,” said Fraser, flipping through the images. “There’s no way he could have climbed out a window?”

“Windows don’t open from the inside, and none of them are broken,” Ray sighed.

“Hm,” said Fraser again.

Ray drank some more coffee, waiting for Fraser to finish up — for all that he claimed otherwise, he could be surprisingly patient sometimes. He knew that Fraser liked to have a chance to absorb all the details of a case before they discussed it.

When Fraser looked up, finished, Ray passed him another, much thinner file. “Meanwhile, in Chicago, Rosanna Tavares went shopping with her friend and roommate, Josephine Bennett. They got separated at the mall, her friend couldn’t find her by the time the place closed, so she went home, figured Rosanna would be there. But she wasn’t. Friend called their local precinct, which was the 1-4, they told her she had to wait before she could file a missing person’s report.”

“Of course,” Fraser murmured, reading the hand-written report from the desk sergeant at the 14th precinct.  

“Around 1 o’clock this morning, Rosanna Tavares walked into this building with Cody Pierce,” Ray concluded. “And that’s when the shitstorm started.”

“So I see,” said Fraser, as the federal agents, led by Lt. Welsh, strode through the bullpen. Ray jumped to his feet, but Lt. Welsh waved him off.

“I hate those guys,”  Ray muttered.

“They’re only doing their job,” Fraser reminded him. “If Ms. Tavares crossed state lines with the child in custody—”

“Yeah, but see, that’s the thing,” said Ray, focusing on Fraser once more. “There’s no evidence that she did.”

“Then how...?” Fraser started to ask.

“I told you,” Ray said. “Weirdness.”

“Indeed.” Fraser watched Lt. Welsh close the blinds on his and the federal agents’ conversation, then turned back to Ray. “What’s Ms. Tavares’s version of events?”

Ray shrugged, polished off his coffee, and crumpled the paper cup in his hand. “Wanna find out?”

Fraser knew better than to bring up the fact that they really shouldn’t be interrogating a federal witness without the agents present. Despite his complaints, Ray loved a mystery, especially a weird mystery, and he was raring to go. Far be it for Fraser to _kill his buzz,_ as Ray would put it.

So he nodded, and Ray set off across the bullpen, leaving Fraser, as usual, to follow. When they opened the door, Caroline Wilson looked up, clearly startled.

Fraser had worked with her a number of times, and they’d developed a sort of fragile trust over the years. She was one of only a few people outside the precinct who knew of Ray’s situation — in fact, Fraser had been the one to explain it to her. Normally, they got along well, but today she was cool and cautious. Fraser couldn’t blame her for that.

“Constable Fraser,” she said cordially. “Detective Vecchio.”

“Caroline,” Fraser greeted her, since she was insistent that he use her first name. “Ms. Tavares.”

“What’s with the boy scout?” Ms. Tavares asked.

“He’s a Mountie,” Ray said shortly. Fraser could tell from her face that this didn’t clear anything up for her, but Ray went on before Fraser could explain further. “Talk to us.”

“Detective Vecchio,” Caroline began tiredly, “we have been through this already. And without Agent Flear or Patel present—”

“We just want to know what happened,” Ray replied.

“I told the agents what happened,” said Ms. Tavares.

“What really happened,” Ray clarified. “Because I know what the Feds are thinking.” He started ticking off list items on his fingers. “They’re thinking they got opportunity, they got means, motive—”

“Motive?” Ms. Tavares repeated incredulously. “What possible motive could I have for kidnapping someone?”

Ray shrugged. “You want kids?” he asked. “Or maybe your... _roommate_ does?”

It took Fraser a moment to catch on to the euphemism, though from the look on everyone else’s faces, he was the last to get it.

He watched Ms. Tavares swallow hard. A caught-out look came into her eyes. “That’s ridiculous,” she said, but her voice wavered slightly.

“Maybe,” Ray admitted, too casual by half. “But the Feds? They see things a certain way. Different from you and me.”

His tone was flat, his subtext was clear, and Fraser again marveled at his partner’s abilities in the interrogation room. At once, he’d gained Ms. Tavares’s trust, or some of it at least, because she knew what Fraser knew — what nobody else in this building knew — about Ray.

And about himself, though that was a topic for another day.

Ms. Tavares glanced uncertainly at Caroline. “You’re gonna think I’m nuts,” she said. “Nuts and guilty, and I’m not either of those things, I swear.”

Caroline’s eyes met Fraser’s across the table, and Fraser knew they were thinking of the same thing: a man who sat in this very room a few years ago, clutching a necklace, telling Fraser something impossible: that he’d been a witness to a crime, even though he wasn’t there. That case had been a kidnapping, too, and Fraser had a feeling that wasn’t lost on Caroline.

He pulled out a chair and took a seat. Ray did the same. “Try us,” Fraser said.

After a long moment, and at a nod from Caroline, Ms. Tavares started to talk.

“I was at the mall with Jo,” she began. “Around 8, Jo said she was going to get something from Starbucks, but I was pretty sure that she was going back to the jewelers to get me a birthday present. We were there earlier, and Jo was trying to find out what I liked.” She smiled faintly. “I think she thought she was being subtle, but I knew what she was doing.

“So I decided I’d head downstairs to the barber and see about getting a trim. That way she’d have lots of time to do what she needed to do. We said we’d meet up at the front entrance at a quarter to nine, and then we’d get the train home. Perfectly normal.

“Jo set off, and I got into the elevator to go down to the barber.” She paused thoughtfully. “I don’t know why I took the elevator. I normally wouldn’t. But I guess I figured it was closer than going around to the escalator. And my feet were hurting.”

“In any case, I take it you didn’t make it to the rendezvous?” Fraser prompted in a low voice, steering them gently back on track.

“No,” Ms. Tavares agreed, refocusing. “No, I— I got into the elevator, and it started to go down. I wasn’t really paying attention at first, when the doors opened, but then I stepped outside and everything was... different.”

“Different how?” Ray asked.

“Well, for starters, it was daytime,” Ms. Tavares said. “That was the first thing I noticed. Even before I realized where I was.”

“And where were you?” Fraser asked.

“I was at a train station,” Ms. Tavares said. She met and held his gaze. “The elevator doors opened, and I wasn’t at the mall anymore. I was at a train station.”

Ray shifted in his chair, a restless motion that Fraser knew all too well. “That doesn’t make any sense,” he said.

Ms. Tavares turned her head to address him directly. “I know. Believe me, I was just as shocked as you are.”

Fraser flipped open the small notepad he kept in his Sam Brown and withdrew a tiny pen from the same pouch. “What did it look like?”

“Big,” said Ms. Tavares without any hesitation. “High ceilings — like, really high. Supported by these huge columns. Marble, I think they were. And rounded windows. They were enormous, floor to ceiling, and bright sunshine was coming through them.

“People were everywhere,” Ms. Tavares went on, “but they didn’t seem to see me. I tried to ask somebody for directions, but it was like she couldn’t hear me. Even the guy at the ticket desk looked right through me.”

“And the boy?” asked Fraser.

“He stood out,” Ms. Tavares replied. “Everybody was wearing dark colors, formal outfits like suits and skirts, but Cody’s shirt was bright red. I saw him going around a corner, so I followed him. He led me to the platform, where this big train engine was pulling up. Everybody started to board, and I thought the kid was going, too, but when the train pulled away, he was still there. And he was so scared.”

This last part came out as a whisper. Fraser reached across the table to lay his hand on Ms. Tavares’s forearm, trying to offer some comfort.

“He was so relieved that I could see him,” Ms. Tavares continued after a brief pause. “I talked to him, found out where he was from and all that, calmed him down a little.”

“Then what happened?” Ray asked.

“We tried to get help,” Ms. Tavares replied. “We tried yelling, waving, even tried to grab somebody as they passed, but it was like we were invisible. The people just kept on walking.”

“How did you get back?” asked Fraser.

“I don’t know,” said Ms. Tavares, sounding shaky and uncertain again. “We tried to open a couple of doors, but our hands just passed through them, and then Cody said he saw something weird on the other side of the station.”

“Weird, like...?” Ray prompted.

“Weird like shimmering,” Ms. Tavares answered. “The wall, it was flickering, like an old movie. Cody and me, we looked at each other, and he said something about Harry Potter. I don’t know who that is, but I grabbed his hand, and... we went through.”

“Through... the wall?” said Ray. He was assessing Ms. Tavares with narrowed eyes, but Fraser could tell he wasn’t suspicious so much as puzzled.

“Through the wall,” Ms. Tavares confirmed. “It got dark, and it felt like we were walking for a really long time. I just held on to Cody’s hand real tight, and next thing I knew, we were on a street corner in Chicago.”

“And you came straight here?” Fraser asked, trying to get the timeline straight in his notes.

“Pretty much,” said Ms. Tavares. “Cody started freaking out. He didn’t know where we were, and he wanted to go home to his mom and dad, so I brought him here. It was the closest police station I could find.” She chuckled humorlessly. “When I saw the clock in the lobby, I freaked out a bit, too. I didn’t know how late it was, my watch still said it was ten after eight.”

Her eyes darted to the side suddenly, and the door to the room swung open with force. “What are you doing in here?” Agent Patel asked, as he and his partner burst through it.

“My job,” Ray shot back. All traces of his kind, listening demeanor were gone at once. “You didn’t even ask your suspect if she needed a glass of water or anything.”

“Oh, so you’re a waiter now,” Agent Flear retorted. “Good for you, Vecchio, that’s a big step up.”

Ray got to his feet, but Fraser tugged at his side before he could lunge. “Ray, perhaps we should—?”

“Yeah, perhaps you should,” said Agent Patel.

“Take your little Mountie friend and get out of here,” Agent Flear added. “This is our case.”

“This is our case,” Ray repeated mockingly as they headed back to his desk. “What a jackass.”

For the sake of politeness, Fraser made a non-committal noise in his throat, but privately he agreed. Surely, it was in the federal agents’ best interest to work with the CPD, especially given that the facts of the case didn’t come close to adding up. The fact that they weren’t even willing to entertain the notion of cooperating with them was, well, jackassery.  

“So what do you think?” Ray asked, shaking Fraser out of his uncharitable thoughts. “Is she on the up-and-up, or what?”

Fraser frowned. “I’m not sure,” he said slowly. “It was quite a tale.”

“Yeah, tale, that’s a good word for it,” Ray agreed. He’d picked up the basketball again and was switching it from hand to hand, his long fingers splayed across the ball’s pebbled surface. Dief’s nose emerged from his cubby hole beneath the desk to track it — right to left, left to right.

“Sounds like something out of _The X-Files,”_ Ray added.

Fraser had never seen that show, but Inspector Thatcher talked about it a lot. “It is certainly bizarre.”

“If I hadn’t heard it myself...” Ray went on. Left to right, right to left went the basketball, and Dief’s nose with it. “If another cop told me a perp gave them a story like that, I’d say it was a load of bull. But... I don’t know. I want to believe her, you know?”

“She did seem convinced of what happened,” said Fraser. “If we’d had more time, we could have questioned her further. Delusions — if that’s indeed what it was — tend to crumble under close scrutiny.”

“My instinct says she’s telling the truth,” Ray said as if Fraser hadn’t spoken. He threw the ball up in the air. Caught it, threw it again. Dief’s entire head was out of the desk now, bouncing like it was attached to a spring.

“It’s not logical,” said Fraser. Ray’s eyes landed on his, and they exchanged a wry grin at the reference to their ongoing debate — the debate that nearly ended their partnership. “But I agree.”

With a sigh, Ray pushed his chair back from his desk and started to toss the basketball higher into the air. “Well—”

Whatever he was going to say got cut off by the white blur that was Diefenbaker, lunging for the ball. He knocked it up with his nose — it hit the ceiling with a thump that dislodged one of the tiles and let loose a shower of dust.

Ray swore and sneezed. A few police officers in the bullpen laughed. Fraser scolded the wolf and started apologizing profusely. Unperturbed, Dief trotted off towards Francesca’s desk, Ray’s ball held tight between his jaws.

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” said Ray, brushing himself off.

Fraser scowled. “Not really. He could have seriously damaged the ceiling.”

“No, it’s...”

Fraser looked up when he didn’t finish his sentence. Ray’s fingers were hovering a few inches above his left shoulder, which was still covered in dust. He had a far-away look in his eye.

“Ray?”

“The ceiling,” Ray said, like this was supposed to mean something. “Come on.”

He grabbed his jacket, and just like that he was off again, leaving Fraser to follow in his wake.


	2. Chapter 2

Fraser was surprised when Ray parked the GTO at the Harold Washington Library. Fraser had been here several times, of course — it was a beautiful and peaceful building, and it had become something of a refuge since he’d started living full-time at the Consulate. But until now he wasn’t convinced that Ray knew it existed. He was glad, obviously, though part of him regretted the fact that his first trip here with Ray was by necessity.

Not that he knew what that necessity was; Fraser had wanted to ask on the short drive over, but Ray still had that look about him — the one that said his brain was working on the case and didn’t want to be interrupted. Finally, as they passed through the front doors, leaving the noise of the street behind them, Ray started to explain.

“I had this aunt,” he said, in an appropriately hushed voice. “She worked in DC, and every few months, she’d come up to Chicago for a visit. When I was really little, she took the train, and we used to meet her at this station.”

“Which station?” Fraser asked. He followed Ray into the elevator, and Ray pressed the button for the fifth floor.

“See, that’s the thing: I don’t know,” Ray replied. “But I remember it had this really high ceiling, because one time my parents ran into a friend of theirs and got talking, and I got bored, so I thought it’d be fun to try and bounce this little ball I had off the floor so hard it would hit the ceiling.”

“And did it work?”

“No, of course not,” Ray said quickly. “But that’s not the point. The point is, I haven’t thought about this in years, okay? Then today, listening to that lady talk about what she saw... I think I believed her because it sounded familiar, like some place I’d seen before. And when Dief went after the ball, it clicked.”

“He still shouldn’t have done that,” Fraser muttered.

“He’s a do— wolf, whatever. It happens,” Ray said, waving Fraser’s apology away. The elevator doors opened, and they stepped out into the lobby. “And if it ends up being the break I need to solve this case out from under the suits’ nose, I’ll buy him a dozen donuts in thanks.”

Fraser was spared from having to explain why that really wasn’t the best course of action by the arrival of an attractive young woman pushing a cart full of books. Her nametag read _Jenny Li._ Despite his multiple trips to the library, Fraser had never encountered her before, and it was a good thing, too, because he knew instantly that all she could see was his uniform.

“Hi, I’m Jenny, can I help you find something?” she asked hopefully.

“Yeah, hi, I need to know where you keep the maps,” Ray answered. He’d shifted his body language slightly, the way he often did when women approached them; he was clocking her as a threat, and positioning himself to get between her and Fraser if he had to. Fraser appreciated it.

“Maps?” Ms. Li repeated, sounding dubious.

“Yeah, historical maps, old pictures of the city, that kind of thing,” said Ray.

“Oh, you mean the municipal records,” Ms. Li corrected him with some relief. “Just past the stacks to your left, you’ll see the signs.”

“Great, thanks,” Ray said, turning in that direction.

“And what about you?” Ms. Li asked Fraser.

“He’s with me,” said Ray brusquely.

Ms. Li backed off, looking startled, so Fraser gave her a polite smile before following Ray. “Thank you kindly, ma’am.”

“Any time,” she called after them.

Ray huffed out a sigh, but he didn’t comment, and Fraser didn’t feel like bringing it up. A few steps later, they did indeed see the signs: _City of Chicago Municipal References,_ which led them to a small, dusty room stacked high with shelves.

“Needle in a haystack,” Ray muttered.

“What, exactly, are we here for?” Fraser asked, hoping to resume their conversation from before Jenny Li interrupted them.

“If I can find out the name of the station I went to as a kid, I might be able to get a picture for our suspect,” Ray answered. He was skimming the titles of the leather-bound books with an expression of growing dismay. “But how am I supposed to find something without knowing what it’s called?”

“Hm,” said Fraser. He didn’t ask how knowing which train station Ms. Tavares had allegedly visited would help them clear or convict her of the kidnapping charges. “Well, perhaps we’re starting in the middle instead of the beginning,” he said instead.

“Meaning...?”

“Meaning that we’re trying to figure out the location of the train station, when, really, we should take a step back and search for buildings that share its architectural features,” Fraser explained. “That will help us identify it, and once we can identify it—”

“Then we can locate it,” said Ray. “Good in theory. But how do you suggest we do that?”

He followed Fraser around the shelves, back to the center of the room, where a previously vacant counter was now occupied by an older woman stamping books. “We ask,” Fraser told Ray simply.

“Excuse me, ma’am?” he said. The woman looked up and smiled. “I wonder if you have any reference books about Chicago’s architecture.”

“Oh, yes, of course, officer,” said the woman, getting to her feet. As she led them to a back corner, she smiled over her shoulder. “We don’t see many Mounties in here.”

“No, ma’am, I imagine not,” Fraser replied. “Constable Benton Fraser, RCMP, and this is my partner, Detective Raymond Vecchio of the Chicago Police Department.”

“Dana Warner,” the librarian replied. “Nice to meet you.”

“How you doing?” Ray said, barely disguising his discomfort with elderly people.

“Oh, fine, fine,” Ms. Warner said. “Ah, here it is.”

She stopped in front of a shelf that, to the untrained eye, looked exactly the same as the others. She started to pull out a book that was almost too thick for her hand, so Fraser stepped forward to assist. Together, they brought the book down to a nearby table, and Ms. Warner opened it.

“This is my most comprehensive resource on Chicago’s architecture,” she explained, showing them the table of contents. “It’s even got recreations of the buildings we lost in the fire.”

“Okay, but what if we don’t know what it’s called,” Ray said again. Fraser read some of the entries and understood his concern; the buildings were listed by name. “I have to check every page?”

“I suppose you could do that,” Ms. Warner said. “Or you could ask me. I wrote it.”

Fraser blinked. Ray looked equally taken aback. Ms. Warner, however, was smiling slyly.

“I love it when I get to do that,” she said with a chuckle. “So what are you looking for?”

“My friend visited a train station when he was a child, and he’s trying to identify it,” Fraser told her, choosing to leave out the other aspects.

“Right,” said Ray. “I don’t know where it was, because I was only a little kid, like maybe six years old? But I know what it looked like.”

He began to give Ms. Warner a description of the station, but as soon as he mentioned the columns, she cut him off.

“Would this have been in the ’60s?” she asked.

Ray nodded. “Yeah, I was born in ’61, so— Jesus, I’m old,” he interrupted himself, and he ran a hand through his hair.

Ms. Warner laughed out loud. “Tell me about it.”

She opened the book, skimmed the table of contents again, and flipped to a page about three-quarters of the way through it. Ray bent over the table, and so did Fraser. They were suddenly so close that he could smell Ray’s aftershave. He sniffed unobtrusively, then leaned back just a bit. Ray didn’t seem to notice, which, really, was for the best.

“Does that look right?” Ms. Warner asked.

“Yeah,” Ray exclaimed. “Yeah, that’s it, that’s the place. Grand Central Station— well, that’s original.”

Ms. Warner chuckled. “I suppose so. It wasn’t used much after the war, but it was a beautiful place.”

Fraser nodded, assessing the pictures. He saw immediately why the building made an impression; even though most of the photos were in black and white, it was breathtaking, with the high ceilings, huge columns, and rounded windows that Ms. Tavares had described. Some of them looked to be stained glass; Fraser wished there were more colored photos. 

“Built 1890, closed 1969, demolished 1971,” Ray read. “West Harrison St., near Wells and Polk....” He looked up, frowning in thought. “Harrison near Wells and Polk, what’s there now?”

“Nothing,” Ms. Warner answered him. “They keep talking about building condominiums, but they haven’t done anything with it yet.”

“Too bad,” Ray commented.

“Can we photocopy these pages, ma’am?” Fraser asked. “They could prove very helpful to a criminal investigation.”

“Of course,” Ms. Warner said at once.

By the time Fraser was finished with the copier, Ray looked more than ready to get out of there. Fraser nonetheless made sure to take an extra second to return Ms. Warner’s book to the shelf and tip his hat to her.

“Where are we off to?” he asked, when they stepped back into the elevator — thankfully, their return journey was uninterrupted by Ms. Li, or anyone else.

“I want to see the empty lot,” Ray replied.

“Why?” Fraser couldn’t help but ask.

Ray shrugged. The elevator dinged, and the doors opened. “Call it a hunch,” he said, and he crossed the lobby with long, sure strides. All Fraser had to do was keep up.

* * *

The location of the former Grand Central Station was indeed empty — a shame, Fraser thought again, thinking of the history that the city had flattened when they demolished it. A sign announced the condominiums that Ms. Warner had mentioned at the library, but the pictures were faded from sunlight and peeling with age.

“Hm,” said Fraser, without really meaning to.

“What?” Ray said instantly.

“Oh, nothing,” Fraser replied, but Ray’s nostrils flared, and he amended his answer quickly. “I was just thinking about how bizarre this case is.”

Ray nodded. He surveyed the empty lot, then turned around and took in the other side of the street. “Coffee?” he asked.

Fraser turned, too, and saw what Ray was looking at — a small café with a big front window that faced the lot. Instead of answering, he set off in its direction, and Ray followed.

The bell over the door chimed dully as they walked in. The place was empty, aside from an old man in one corner and the woman behind the counter.

“Hi, boys, what can I get for you?” she asked brightly.

Ray ordered a coffee — black with lots of sugar — and Fraser asked for tea. The woman frowned slightly, then fetched a can of iced tea from the cooler. Fraser sighed internally — _Americans_ — and changed his order, opting for a black coffee as well.

“Were you working last night?” Ray asked as he handed the employee a handful of bills.

“I’m working all the time,” she answered with a slight laugh. “This is my shop after all.”

“You see anything weird across the street?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Fraser saw the old man in the corner look up, clearly listening.

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” the employee answered. “I closed up around ten, but it was pretty quiet, so I was mostly in the back, cleaning.”

Ray nodded. “Excuse me,” Fraser said quietly. He brushed Ray’s arm as he went past him.

The old man watched him approach with some suspicion — trying to place the uniform, if Fraser had to guess. It was an expression that he’d seen often enough.

Fraser gestured at the chair across from the old man. “May I?”

“Be my guest,” said the man. Up close, he was somewhat dirty, with cracked skin on the edges of his fingers and greasy hair. He wore six or seven layers of clothes, and he smelled. Homeless, likely.

“Thank you kindly.” Fraser sat. He introduced himself, explained how he’d come to Chicago, and asked the man’s name.

“Bill,” he said shortly. He was still looking at Fraser like he didn’t know what to make of him, but he was clear-eyed and sober.

“Were you here last night, sir?” Fraser asked.

“I was,” Bill answered. “Not like I have anywhere else to go,” he added.

“I wonder if you could tell me anything about the lot across the street,” Fraser said.

“You mean the old train station?” Bill chuckled. “I was there when they tore it down. Damn shame, but the city wanted it gone. They changed all the routes, took away its funding, made it so the place couldn’t function. Then it was easy to convince people that it ought to be tore down. Make more money selling it to real estate developers, they said. Ha. Almost thirty years on, and they ain’t done a thing with it.”

“Did you see anything strange last night?” Fraser asked, trying to keep them on track. “At the lot, I mean?”

Bill nodded slowly. “Maybe. There a reward or something? Officer?”

“How much you want?” That was Ray’s voice, over Fraser’s shoulder.

“Fifty bucks,” Bill said.

“Twenty,” Ray countered.

“Forty-five.”

“Thirty.”

“Forty.”

Ray sighed and pulled out his wallet. “Fine,” he sighed, passing over two twenties. He glared at Fraser like this was his fault.

Fraser ignored him, turning back to Bill, who was tucking the money into one of his inner pockets. “What did you see?”

“A lady and a kid,” Bill answered.

Ray’s demeanor changed at once — from playfully annoyed to alert. All business. Watching him straighten his shoulders and pull his notepad from his jacket pocket, Fraser felt something like pride in his chest; Ray was indeed a very fine police officer.

“What’d they look like?” Ray asked.

“Lady was young, black. Ripped-up jeans, flannel shirt. Kid was white. Blonde hair, red t-shirt.”

“And what time would this have been?” Fraser asked.

Bill shrugged. “Don’t know when they showed up, but I was here till close,” he said. “Then I went out to find somewhere to sleep. Cut through the empty lot, and the lady and the kid were still there.”

“Did you talk to them?” Ray asked.

“Tried to,” said Bill. “They looked like they were lost. Kid was upset, lady looked scared. I asked if they were okay, but they didn’t answer. I followed them for a bit, trying to get their attention, but they acted like they didn’t even know I was there.”

Fraser exchanged a somewhat awkward look with Ray, and thankfully Ray knew exactly what he was getting at. “It wasn’t just that they didn’t want to talk to a homeless guy, was it?”

Bill scoffed. “Trust me, I know what it looks like when people don’t want to talk to a homeless guy. This was different. Like they were in their own little universe.”

“Hm,” said Fraser.

“Yeah, hm is right,” Ray muttered. He sat down beside Fraser and gave Bill a firm look. “Take us through it again. From the top.”

* * *

“So she lied to us,” Ray concluded, as they left the diner after getting everything they could out of Bill.

“Well, we don’t know that,” Fraser said fairly, but Ray shook his head.

“She lied to us.” To Fraser’s surprise, Ray walked past the GTO to the crosswalk, pulling his phone out of his pocket as he did. “Yeah, it’s Vecchio,” he said, but a transport truck went through the intersection then, and Fraser didn’t hear the rest of the brief conversation.

Ray stopped in front of the empty lot where Grand Central Station used to be. It was fenced off, but the chain-link was loose and rusted in spots, and a flurry of footprints told Fraser that many people used it as a short-cut, the way Bill had last night.

“What do you think?” Ray asked him. He seemed to be assessing the footprints as well.

Fraser shook his head. “Unfortunately, it’s almost impossible to tell one set apart from another.”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” said Ray. He lifted the fence and gestured for Fraser to go under.

Putting aside his mild qualms about trespassing, Fraser went ahead. The ground was soft — another reason there were so many footprints — and a diagonal path through the lot was clearly visible.

“Nothing left of it,” Ray said. “No bricks, no debris. I would’ve expected there to be something, like when they tore Comiskey Park down.”

Fraser nodded. That had been a little before his time, but both Rays talked about it a lot.

“But I guess this was a while ago, if they tore it down in the seventies,” Ray continued thoughtfully.

Fraser didn't reply. He left the path and headed to the northeast corner, where Bill said he’d first seen the pair who resembled Ms. Tavares and Cody. He moved carefully, crouching frequently. There were fewer tracks here, but nothing that resembled the sneakers that Ms. Tavares was wearing, and there were too many kid-sized prints to pick out one that could have been Cody’s.

“We should have brought Diefenbaker,” Fraser muttered.

“I’ve got a couple uniforms coming, and they’re bringing Dief with them,” Ray said. Fraser jolted up in surprise, and Ray looked somewhat offended. “What? You think I haven’t tracked enough perps with you by now to know that you need your dog?”

“Wolf,” Fraser corrected mildly, but he smiled. “Thank you, Ray.”

“Yeah, any time. I also asked if our perp could give us something of hers, so Dief can get the scent.”

“What did she say?”

Ray shrugged. “She’s talking it over with her lawyer. Uniforms are gonna canvass the area, see if anybody else saw what Bill saw last night,” he added.

“Good thinking,” said Fraser.

Ray wandered off to the entrance, presumably to await the arrival of the uniformed officers, and Fraser went back to the tracks, but he still couldn’t make heads or tails of them. Nor could he make heads or tails of the case as a whole, if he were being honest.

“Hard to pick up a trail through this muck,” he heard his father say.

“Yes, it is,” Fraser agreed, getting to his feet.

“Quite the case you’ve stumbled into, Benton,” Fraser Sr. went on. “Any theories?”

Fraser shook his head. “Not at the moment, no.”

“But something’s bothering you, isn’t it?”

“Many things are bothering me,” Fraser said. It was an old habit to talk to his father about his work, and even if his father was dead, the habit remained, and had even proven itself useful a few times over the years. “For starters, it doesn’t make any sense. Ms. Tavares said that she and Cody Pierce found themselves at Grand Central Station, but Grand Central Station no longer exists.”

Fraser Sr. nodded. “Too bad, too.”

“Furthermore, there wasn’t enough time for Ms. Tavares to go to Nebraska, pick up Cody Pierce, and bring him back to Chicago,” Fraser went on, “but the FBI said that two people saw her there. And now one person claims to have seen her and the boy here, too.”

“Possibly more,” his father added.

“Possibly more,” Fraser agreed. He expelled a frustrated breath. “But she can’t have been in two places at once, and she can’t have gone somewhere that no longer exists. It’s impossible.”

“Hm,” said his father. He had a faraway look in his eyes. “Well, for what it’s worth, Benton, I’ve learned that there’s very little in life, or death for that matter, that’s truly impossible.”

“Fraser!” Ray called from across the empty lot.

Fraser turned quickly in his direction, and when he glanced back, his father had gone. “Thanks, Dad,” he said to the empty air, before he hurried over to where Ray and Diefenbaker were waiting for him.

* * *

Ms. Tavares had consented to loan them her outer flannel shirt. Dief sniffed it and set off. Ray and Fraser watched him circle the empty lot before arriving at the northeast corner and barking madly.

“So she was here,” said Ray, folding his arms across his chest.

Fraser frowned, listening to Dief. _Here and not here,_ he was saying. _Here and not here._

“Not exactly,” Fraser said slowly. _What do you mean?_ he mouthed at the wolf in Inuktitut.

 _Here and not here,_ Diefenbaker insisted. _Like old Alpha. Here and not here._

Old Alpha was Dief’s moniker for Fraser’s father. Up until now, Fraser had never really considered how Dief saw his father, except that he did; he looked at him, he went around him as if he was a person standing there, but apparently, Dief knew that he was an apparition — here and not here. But he’d never acted like this towards Fraser’s father — barking and growling at the empty air in the corner of the lot, as if there was something frightening there.

“Okay,” Fraser said. He was uneasy now, too. “Come here, Diefenbaker.”

Dief came to his side at once. It was less like an animal being summoned and more like one running away from danger.

“I think we’d better get back to the station,” Fraser said, though there was no logical reason for him to suggest that; he just wanted to leave.

“Yeah, I think the uniforms can handle it from here,” Ray agreed, and he turned to go.

“Wait,” said Fraser, laying a hand on his arm. He couldn’t take his eyes off the spot that Dief had been barking at.

“What?”

With an effort, Fraser looked at his partner. “Can we... can someone tape that area off?”

Ray blinked, assessing Fraser’s expression. The word _why_ was forming on his lips, and Fraser watched him suppress the urge to ask. “Okay,” he said instead, waving two of the officers over.

All of the sudden, Dief growled — loud and startling. Fraser and Ray both looked down in surprise. Then something caught Fraser’s eye in front of him. He jerked his head up, saw a flash of yellow light in the empty spot where Dief had raised the alert. It was only there for an instant, but Fraser felt there was something familiar about the light — the color, the shape, the sense of urgency that it triggered in him.

“Did you see...?” he started to ask, but Ray was talking to the other officers again, and, besides, he had his back to the area.

Dief growl-barked again, but this time he surged forward. “Dief!” Fraser shouted, grabbing for him, but he was too slow, and of course Dief couldn’t see him yell.

Ray, alerted by Fraser’s shout, shoved the officers aside and lunged for the wolf — he caught him, but Dief’s momentum couldn’t be slowed, and the two of them rolled into the muddy spot that Dief had been barking at just moments before.

“Stupid d—” Fraser heard him say, but that was all he heard.

Time seemed to slow down. Fraser saw the round, yellowy light materialize again. It made stark shadows of Ray and Diefenbaker. And then came the sound — the engine’s thunderous roar, the whine of a whistle, the clatter of metal wheels on the track. And then—

And then it was gone, and with it, Fraser’s partner and his wolf. Gone like they had never been there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I fabricated some details here, including the coffee shop across the street from the former site of Grand Central Station. Also, based on what I read, I made the assumption that the lot was still empty in the 1990s; if I'm wrong, let's just call it creative licence, shall we?

**Author's Note:**

> The Case of Miriam Golding:  
> <https://youtu.be/5XUFXi009t4>  
> <https://high-strangeness.fandom.com/wiki/Miriam_Golding_Disappearance>  
> [https://www.phantomsandmonsters.com/2017/06/history-of-chicago-strangeness-part-1.html (second one down)](https://www.phantomsandmonsters.com/2017/06/history-of-chicago-strangeness-part-1.html)
> 
> Grand Central Station:  
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Central_Station_(Chicago)>


End file.
